Portsmouth residents get final chance to speak out on budget

PORTSMOUTH — City residents will get their second and last chance Tuesday night to let city officials know how they feel about the proposed fiscal year 2015 budget.

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By Jeff McMenemy

seacoastonline.com

By Jeff McMenemy

Posted May. 26, 2014 at 5:20 PM
Updated May 26, 2014 at 5:22 PM

By Jeff McMenemy

Posted May. 26, 2014 at 5:20 PM
Updated May 26, 2014 at 5:22 PM

» Social News

PORTSMOUTH — City residents will get their second and last chance Tuesday night to let city officials know how they feel about the proposed fiscal year 2015 budget.

One resident, Mark Brighton, already shared his feelings when he brought a chart to last week’s City Council meeting illustrating how his water and sewer bills have jumped more than 100 percent in the past five years.

The combined cost of his and his wife’s annual property taxes and water and sewer bills have jumped from $7,124 in 2008 to $8,480 in 2013, Brighton said. That’s a 19 percent increase. The couple’s annual water and sewer bills jumped from $874 in 2008 to $1,780 in 2013, Brighton said, a 103 percent increase.

The pattern of rising property taxes and water and sewer rates have made it difficult for some residents to pay their bills, Brighton said.

“The council doesn't seem to care enough about the taxpayers to do something for the taxpayers,” Brighton said.

The proposed $96.7 million budget calls for a property tax hike of 1.64 percent if approved as proposed.

The proposed budget calls for an increase of 3.93 percent or $3.65 million.

Brighton said because 85 percent of the budget is spent on personnel, he believes the city should eliminate 30 teaching jobs over five years through not filling positions when they come open.

That would still keep the teacher to student ratio at or lower than the level agreed upon by the teacher's contract.

“There isn't an organization in the country in the country that hasn't had to absorb job cuts,” Brighton said.

City Councilor Esther Kennedy also said at a recent meeting that the proposed property tax hike, combined with a proposed 5 percent hike in the sewer rate, is too much for residents on fixed incomes or the city's working poor to pay.

City Councilor Jack Thorsen said Sunday “increases have outstripped many residents' ability to keep up.”

“Many of our residents are on fixed incomes, so when the cost to live here increases, that means less disposable income for things like food and medical expenses,” he said. “We have great city employees, but it seems unfair to me that employees' income can go up faster than inflation, guaranteed by contractual increases in salary and step promotions, and made possible by taking away any increase in income a resident may have, if any.”

Thorsen called for the fiscal year tax rate “remain flat or go down.”

“This means reducing the budget by at least $1.2 million,” he said. “The cuts can come from the additional personnel added to the budget and by reducing the capital improvement plan to a more reasonable level.”

He also suggested restructuring police patrols, which he believes are too heavy in some parts of the city, and address fire department overtime.

“We need a shift in perspective. Residents are not detached customers to whom services are to be sold for as much as is politically possible,” Thorsen said. “Nor are we milk cows to be drained dry to satisfy the insatiable thirst of governments, local or otherwise. We are the owners of this great enterprise we call home. As an owner, I want to see costs go down and profits go up.”

Tuesday night's meeting is scheduled to begin at 6:30 in City Council chambers in City Hall.